An Inconvenient Truth

Friends of Branded!

Happy Saturday and I hope you had a great week (and are enjoying the Thanksgiving weekend).

Earlier this week, Schatz, Julie and I had a call with our friends and partners at Share Our Strength where we discussed our collaboration on the No Kid Hungry campaign and some planning for the year ahead.

On the call, Mr. Billy Shore, the Founder and Executive chair of Share Our Strength, the parent company of the No Kid Hungry campaign, was talking about the importance of honest feedback and addressing issues head-on, such as that in a country as wealthy and generous as the United States, childhood hunger is a tragedy we cannot accept.

Then Billy did something that was either completely for my benefit and to help me with this week’s Top of the Fold, or far more likely b/c he too likes to reference movies from decades ago to make his points, he sighted the film Bulworth, the 1998 American political satire film co-written, co-produced, directed by and starring, Warren Beatty. In the film, CA Senator Jay Bulworth, played by Mr. Beatty, is tired of politics and unhappy with his life, so Bulworth begins to “tell it like it is” and speaks his mind freely, which the public adores and results in his winning his re-election campaign (among other things that took place throughout the film).

The fact is, both things can be true: (i) Mr. Shore wants more brutal honesty when it comes to our addressing a childhood hunger problem, we, as a country, know how to solve, and (ii) thanks to Billy’s movie reference, I got my theme for this week’s H^2! 😊

In the film, Senator Bulworth reaches a breaking point and does the unthinkable: he starts telling the truth. Speaking unfiltered, direct, and raw, his words shock and unsettle people, but it also wakes them up. Suddenly the conversations become real, which exposes problems, but also allows solutions to emerge. When the truth is spoken, things start to look different now that someone has finally said what others were also thinking.

Restaurants, we need our own Bulworth moment.

For years, operators have been navigating a feedback landscape defined by extremes. We celebrate glowing five-star reviews from loyalists and curse the nuclear one-star rants from one-visit-nihilists. What’s missing is the most valuable and needed feedback that comes from the honest, middle-of-the-bell-curve commentary that reveals what’s working, what’s not, and what’s actually driving hospitality forward.

The truth isn’t dangerous, it’s liberating. Honest feedback is fuel; it’s energy and it’s so necessary. It unlocks better training, smarter menu engineering, tighter operations, and ultimately a better guest experience.

But here’s the rub and maybe a direction you didn’t expect me to take this (I’m pausing here for effect…still pausing). 😊

The movie Bulworth hinges on a simple idea: people say they want honesty, but when they actually hear it, they often shoot the messenger. Senator Bulworth, at the end of the film, gets shot for telling the truth (and no, I feel no guilt revealing the ending of a movie that was released almost 30 years ago).

You know why the phrase “don’t shoot the messenger” is such a longstanding cliché and ranks at #19 on Webster’s “All-Time Greatest & Most Successful Clichés” list (a list that doesn’t actually exist, but come on, that would be a pretty cool list, right)? This incredibly common, overused phrase for warning someone not to blame the person delivering bad news remains current and in high-demand b/c people continue to do exactly that, blame, and get angry with the person delivering the message.

Quick sidebar (or an “unfortunate digression”, as Mr. Brandon Barton, the CEO at Bite Kiosk likes to refer to these moments as), I let everyone I work with know that I don’t shoot messengers. I specifically say that I communicate this commitment so that in the event I’m EVER see me violating it (which I will not), I’ve armed them with something they can and should throw back at me.

I share this belief b/c of something I’ve learned years ago and it’s really quite simple, if you’re a person who shoots messengers, people will stop giving you messages.

Now returning to our regular programming, restaurants face this same dynamic every day and here comes an inconvenient truth, we own this and need to do far better!

Our guests notice things (what, you think they’re hard of noticing?). Guests may too often have unrealistic expectations (that’s a topic for another Top of the Fold), but they’re still in the mix with us and represent a much needed and incredibly important source of feedback.

They notice slow service, inconsistent execution, a dish that’s a little off, pricing that feels out of sync (or Schatzy’s biggest issues - not taking his first drink order fast enough or a server pouring his bottle of sparkling water). But as opposed to speaking up in real-time, they stay silent (please note: Schatzy NEVER stays silent on his high-priority issues). This isn’t done b/c our guests don’t care, but b/c they don’t want to deal with the fallout.

Restaurant operators claim to want honest feedback in real-time, but far too often, that’s just not true. You want to know why guests don’t give immediate, honest feedback? It’s b/c too often (far too often), they’ve seen honesty backfire. Our guests don’t want to be labeled “difficult.” They don’t want to embarrass a server. They don’t want to get a manager in trouble. They don’t want a simple comment to escalate into a scene.

So, what do guests do? Great question!

Our guests hold back; they swallow the truth and then they walk out the door. These aren’t the guests that go bang out a negative review online when they leave the restaurant. These are the guests that had real feedback to share, but the restaurant never gets the information it desperately needs.

We’ve all been there. A meal isn’t going well, for whatever the reason. It happens. A manager or maître d’ stops by your table and asks, “how’s everything?” All heads look up, smile, and say “great,” and the inquirer acknowledges the polite & positive feedback and moves on.

That’s the tragedy and a missed opportunity. Operators want the truth, and they need the truth. Real-time, unfiltered feedback is one of the most powerful levers for improving the guest experience. But too often operators demonstrate that they can’t handle the truth!

If guests are made to feel that giving feedback is akin to telling inconvenient truths, and that they need to brace for backlash, or wait for someone to take it the wrong way, guests will keep quiet.

The result? Our industry ends up managing problems it can’t see.

It would be easy for me to make mention here that one of Branded’s most important portfolio companies, Ovation, a frictionless feedback, streamlined guest recovery, and operational insights platform focused exclusively on the guest and perfected for restaurants, is our ResTech solution for guest feedback, but despite that self-interested plug for our friends at Ovation, the issue I’m talking about this week goes beyond what any SaaS company can do (even if it’s the very best in the industry). 😊

Restaurants need to create a culture where sharing feedback doesn’t feel like stepping into a spotlight. Where honesty is welcomed, as opposed to punished. We need to thank the messenger, not shoot them b/c the sooner operators get the truth, the faster they can elevate the experience.

We’re an industry where margins are thin, labor is tight, and expectations are high.

The truth isn’t risky; it’s a gift and we should all treat and embrace it as such.

It takes a village.

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